How It Works

Have you ever been told that you’ve got eyes in the back of your head? Do you have a heightened sense of taste? Maybe you’re one of the exceptional few with synesthesia, meaning you can see smells, taste colours or some other simultaneous sensory com

This scanning electron microscope image reveals the cubic shape of salt crystals. Salt is made up of two ions – positively charged sodium atoms and negatively charged chloride atoms. When these elements come together to form sodium chloride, or salt,

This is Stephen K. Robinson on his third extravehicular activity in 2005. This was part of the first mission since the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003, which killed seven astronauts. While anchored to the Canadarm 2 robotic arm, Robinson comp

In the tropical forests of Australia and throughout Asia, troops of weaver ants march through the foliage on the hunt for insect prey and to find new nests. When a group of ants finds a suitable leafy structure to call home, they create body bridges,

Once a year, people from around the world travel to the Phra Nakhon Khiri Festival in Thailand to celebrate the history of Phetchaburi province and honour King Rama IV of the Chakri Dynasty, who’s referred to as the father of Thai science. Over sever

Large marine predators including great white sharks regularly spend time in the ocean’s twilight and midnight zones, far beneath the depths at which they feed, in a discovery that has mystified scientists. In a new study, data from 12 species of larg

Scientists have discovered a previously undetected water mass in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean: a gigantic body of water stretching across the Atlantic from the tip of Brazil to the Gulf of Guinea near West Africa. The water mass, named the Atlant

Chinese scientists have constructed a numerical model to simulate the Martian atmosphere and assist the country’s plans to collect rock samples from the Red Planet. The model replicates the cycles of dust, water and carbon dioxide in Mars’ atmosphere

The deeper we look into space, the further back in time we see. Light emanating from some of the younger galaxies in our universe has to travel for billions of years to reach us, getting picked up by our instruments rich with information from the cos

Archaeologists have unearthed an ornately carved elephant tusk in what may have once been an Iron Age centre of power. The ivory carving features a mythical sphinx, a human head on the body of a winged lion, as well as a depiction of a real lion and

Researchers have built the first general-purpose artificial intelligence (AI) algorithm that can master a wide variety of games, dubbed ‘Student of Games’. Game algorithms are normally designed to master either information-perfect games like Go or ch

Crabs have evolved to migrate from the sea to land then back again multiple times over the last 100 million years. In a new study, researchers found that true crabs, which consist of 7,600 species across 109 families, have evolved to migrate from mar

Huge ‘megabeds’ from ancient supervolcano eruptions are hiding at the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea. Their discovery points to a cycle of catastrophic events that appear to hit the region every 10,000 to 15,000 years. Megabeds are huge sub-marine d

Can you name a famous elephant? Babar, perhaps? Or Dumbo? Memorable though these monikers may be to humans, they sound nothing like the names elephants give each other. If you’re an elephant, your name is something more like a low, rumbling sound, sc

It may be possible to predict whether a person’s lung cancer could return after surgery by zooming in on the seemingly healthy tissue near their tumours. Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the US. One of the most common types is lun

Archaeologists have discovered the remains of what appears to be an ancient sheep-drawn chariot near the famous Terracotta Army in northwestern China. The remains were found in the ‘western tomb’ at the site of Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s mausoleum, a fe

A fresh analysis of Moon rocks brought home during the Apollo missions has revealed the presence of hydrogen. This suggests future astronauts could use water available right on the Moon for life support and rocket fuel. Researchers with the US Naval

£60 / $64.95 TANGRAMFACTORY.COM The SmartRope PURE allows you to keep track of your jump rope workouts using its built-in magnetic sensors. Paired with your smartphone, you will be able to track not only the basic skip counts but also undergo interva

Senses have been around for billions of years, ever since prehistoric bacteria began interacting with their environment. The first sense on the scene was likely taste – a way for bacteria to detect nearby nutrients some 2 billion years ago. However,

The ability to see comes from a collaboration of optical lenses and specialised cells called photoreceptors. When light bounces off the objects around you, it hits your eyes through a lens called the cornea and passes an opening called the pupil, the

Our perception of sound comes from two handy organs sitting neatly on either side of our heads. As sound waves move into the ear canal and arrive at the eardrum, they vibrate it. The eardrum is a thin membrane that carries these vibrations around thr

How sight and sound find their way through the human brain 1 RIGHT EYE The vision in your right field of view is interpreted by the left side of your brain. 2 LEFT EYE The vision in your left field of view is interpreted by the right side of your bra

The cacophony of scents and odours in the world can be detected by a small patch of tissue in the roof of your nasal cavity called the olfactory epithelium. Within this are millions of olfactory sensory cells that patiently await odour chemicals bind

More than just a sense of gastronomic enjoyment, taste has played an important role in evolution. For example, sweetness acts as an indicator of sugar for energy, while the savoury taste of umami signals proteins and essential amino acids. Taste can

From fingertips to the frontal lobe on the journey of touch The ability to feel our surroundings is one of the first senses humans developed. Unlike the other four classic senses, touch is multifaceted and is perceived as a result of multisense syste

Unlike Spider-Man, whose Spidey-Sense saves him from imminent danger, humans may have a super sense that’s reserved for detecting spiders. A 2014 study published in the journal Evolution and Human Behaviour found that study participants showed an unc

The term ‘sixth sense’ can conjure up thoughts of the supernatural. In some ways our bodies might actually be tuned to the workings of the paranormal or able to predict the future. While science is yet to prove the existence of a clairvoyant sixth se

Have you ever had that feeling you’re being watched or that someone in the crowd is looking at you? It’s a phenomenon known as gaze detection, and it’s the brain’s way of keeping an eye on potential threats. Gaze has been an important part of human e

Around 3,000 BCE, groups of people began their historic voyages from southeast Asia and Pacific islands such as New Guinea to discover the wealth of tropical islands dotted around the Pacific Ocean. Their first stop was the Solomon Islands, then the

In 1975, the Polynesian Voyaging Society launched a new generation of voyaging canoes, including Hōkūle’a. It was the first time in almost 600 years that a traditional canoe of this kind was constructed in Hawaii. This type of Polynesian canoe is rem

As settlements emerged throughout Oceania and Polynesia’s many islands, canoes weren’t just used for grand maritime explorations, but also to carry out day-to-day tasks. Smaller canoes known as va’a outriggers were paddle-operated for personal or sma

Easter Island was named by European explorer Jacob Roggeveen ■

You may have heard people say that human beings are ‘made from stardust’, perhaps with vaguely mystical overtones suggesting that this makes us unique or special in some way. But there’s another perfectly scientific sense in which we really are made

A huge variety of chemical compounds make up the world around us, from the minerals in rocks to the DNA in our cells. But all of these compounds are made up of different combinations of the same basic elements, of which a mere 92 are found in Earth’s

The first matter in the universe was formed in the first three minutes after the Big Bang. This mostly took the form of hydrogen (H) and helium (He), and it still accounts for all the hydrogen atoms in the universe, including those in Earth’s water (

While ‘stardust’ is a poetic rather than technical term, the heavier atoms thrown out by stars into the interstellar medium really do clump together in the form of tiny dust grains. As these grains drift around the universe, they can sometimes be acc

It’s easy to say that the Sun and its planets formed from elements created in a previous generation of stars, but how do we know that? We can see the same processes going on today, where the latest generation of stars are just being born. One of the

The oxygen atoms making up almost two-thirds of our body mass originated in supernova explosions. Three-quarters of our nitrogen comes from low-mass stars, and the rest comes from supernovae. For potassium, the ratio is around 82 per cent supernovae

This iconic view was first photographed by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 1995, and then a second time in 2014 to produce the image below. Located in a star-forming region called the Eagle Nebula, the pillars are made of interstellar dust – or ‘sta

Whether it’s the invading vibrations of outside traffic or the cacophony of sounds created by TVs and smartphones, our homes are a hotbed of sound waves. The basic science of sound is simple: when an object vibrates, it causes the molecules in the ai

Chocolate is a complex chemical delight containing over 500 individual flavour components, together with stimulants and a host of antioxidants. With that many ingredients, it’s no surprise that crafting chocolate is a science in itself, requiring car

You’re only as old as you feel, the saying goes, but what if different parts of your body aged at different speeds? It turns out they do. A system for studying the age of our bodies has been developed, and it shows that different tissues inside us ar

507-year-old Ming, an ocean quahog clam, was the oldest animal ever discovered. When he was originally aged by researchers at Bangor University in Wales, he was thought to be 405 years old. But by counting his shell’s outer growth rings, they discove

Between 20 and 40 per cent of planet Earth is covered in grasslands, across every continent except for Antarctica. Grass is a low-growing, flowering plant with groups of narrow leaves growing from its base. The leaves of this plant are usually anchor

Savannas are usually found in tropical regions with distinct wet and dry seasons. The grasslands consist of tall grasses and scattered trees such as acacia and baobab trees. These grasslands hold a variety of grass species and wildflowers. Prairie gr

The grass genus Festuca makes up most UK lawns 26 per cent of plant life is grass ■

Grass is so widespread that it’s easy to take it for granted. However, these plants are important for keeping our planet’s ecosystems healthy. They cover and protect the soil underneath, limiting erosion from rain and harsh winds. Grass roots can rea

Food inside a cow’s rumen is allowed to sit and ferment before it ruminates and is sent back through the digestive system. The byproduct of this is a greenhouse gas called methane. Each cow can produce around 120 kilograms of methane per year, which

There are many different ruminant mammals, such as giraffes, camels and antelope, but only a handful of birds share a cow’s way of eating. The first birds that were found to digest food in this way were hoatzin (Opisthocomus hoazin), prehistoric-look

On a nice sunny day, there’s nothing a dung beetle likes to do more than seek out some animal faeces, ball it up and roll it away for suppertime. With a pair of poop-sensitive antennae on their heads, dung beetles use their keen sense of smell to loc

Dung beetles first evolved around 115 to 130 million years ago. Using DNA sequence data, an international team of researchers discovered that their evolution correlated with the diversification and dominance of flowering plants called angiosperms. Du

The ancient Egyptians believed that dung beetles were responsible for the Sun’s movements There are over 60 species of dung beetles in the UK ■

Sea foam is a natural dispersal of nutrients, and can provide a habitat for microscopic animals like amphipods and protective coverage for crustaceans. But too much foam can be toxic. Sometimes sea foam builds up following large algal blooms at the s

After a particularly wavy day, the sea is often left with a foamy residue covering its surface that sticks to the sandy shorelines. These frothy trimmings are usually organic marine matter that has been churned up by the waves. Making up this foam ar

Florida is a US state collapsing in on itself. Amid the city streets, quiet suburbs and citrus groves, gateways are opening up into the real, hidden Florida. Virtually the whole of the Sunshine State, from the Keys in the south to the border with Geo

Florida may be the sinkhole capital, but other places have their deadly equivalents. In 2010, a sinkhole killed at least 15 people in Guatemala City. It opened in the wake of Tropical Storm Agatha, occurring just three years after a similar sinkhole

China’s Xiaoxhai Tiankeng is the deepest sinkhole in the world at 660 metres ■

Between 400 BCE and 106 CE, Petra in Jordan was the capital of the Nabataean Kingdom. The Nabataeans were an ancient Arabic tribe, 20,000 of whom lived in the cliff-carved city of Petra. Inside this sandstone metropolis is a hidden maze of monuments,

To reach Llechwedd Deep Mine – over 150 metres beneath the rolling mountains of North Wales – you must travel on Europe’s steepest cable railway. North Wales has been a slate-quarrying site for over 1,800 years; between 1846 and the 1980s, miners col

Stone doors in Derinkuyu weighed 500 kilograms Derinkuyu translates to ‘deep well’ and is named after the water collection systems built into the city ■

From 1907 to 1994, this station was part of the Piccadilly Line, but was closed when the number of passengers alighting here dropped. During the Blitz the station provided shelter to Londoners. In 1922, City Road station was shut after 21 years runni

The city of Zipaquirá in central Colombia is home to a large salt deposit, making it a popular salt-mining location since around the 5th century BCE. The deposit formed 70 million years ago when an inland sea dried out and became buried by layers of

Slightly east of Naours village in northern France, a hiding place is concealed beneath the soft, woodland-covered limestone rock. The secret city was first carved by Romans in the 3rd century CE, and the end result was a matrix of 300 rooms and 28 g

The Zipaquirá salt mine has an average temperature of 14 degrees Celsius Bicycle electricity generators were used in some Cu Chi tunnels ■

Over the course of six years, 15,000 men built Hadrian’s Wall ■

Can anything prepare you for war? In the armed forces, military personnel train to use weapons, are educated on the impact of crucial decision-making and learn how to command large dispersed groups on the ground. Usually, all of these techniques are

Around 6,000 aircraft fly in the UK’s skies every day Live training is still essential for pilots to experience the physiological impact of jet flight ■

To increase military power and to assure mutual protection between countries, national armed forces ally themselves with others. These countries aren’t necessarily close geographically, and that can make training as a single force problematic. The VR

When replacing physical training spaces with a synthetic world, artificial intelligence (AI) is essential in providing trainees with a realistic platform to make their own decisions and mistakes. Almost all of the decisions a trainee soldier will mak

The Varjo headset tracks your eyes at 200 movements per second The first VR headset was invented in 1968 ■

What are the main benefits of the armed forces using this VR training tool? Sustainability is definitely one. Not doing training live saves a huge amount of emissions, and it’s repeatable. When you’re doing something live with an aircraft, you’re goi

20 years ago, this gadget was a game-changer. The fact you think nothing of how commonplace they are today just goes to show what an impact they’ve had. Also known as a USB stick, flash drive or pen drive, a memory stick is a portable way of storing

Electronics are moving away from being components connected by wires and becoming an intrinsic part of buildings, cars and clothing. The technology making this possible is plastic electronics. These are polymers – large molecules composed of repeatin

Today’s computers process data as bits, which can exist either as a zero or a one. Hard drives store these bits as microscopic patches of magnetism on magnetic plates, where the information can then be converted to electrical signals. Quantum computi

Any element can become a gas; you just need to heat it past its boiling point. For gold that’s 2,856 degrees Celsius, which is hotter than the temperature in an arc furnace, so it’s difficult to boil a bar of gold. You can create small amounts of gol

Joints are vital to allow movement and function to an otherwise rigid skeletal frame. The more free the movement, the less stable the joint. For example, both the hip and shoulder are ball-and-socket joints. Since the hip has a deeper socket, it is m

To perform a 360-degree loop, an aircraft needs to achieve three phases in quick succession: the entry, the climb and the exit. Each of these would cause particular problems to anything the size and weight of even a small commercial jet. Entry has to

This incredible photo of a wreck at Gare Montparnasse in Paris shows a very dramatic scene of a train that crashed through the wall and partially tumbled into the street. The cause? Both mechanical failure and human error. The train was late, so the